Anzac wrote:
I thought the idea behind buying StatDNA was to use it as a filter to eliminate much of the guess work from general/initial scouting, so that the scouts were able to concentrate on genuine targets of interest. I don't recall it being described as intended to make decisions on actual transfers.
Check the New York Times article about them that was posted here several times already. They explicitly advised against signing the likes of Griezmann and Kevin de Bruyne
This also ties in to Claudes last question - although what we want is not improved data but an improved team. The first thing that people dont always realise is you basically can't scout good players. You can scout players who are doing well at their current clubs, which is the result of his innate talent, adequate coaching, his feeling comfortable at the club and in the city/country and many other smaller factors, many of whom are not quantifiable and wont show up in any database. Or you can go one harder and scout players who you think are talented but are not doing well at the moment.
The best of scouts will be able to do either and pick a talented player who cant put it together at his current club, like Jovic at Benfica. Three years after his first team debut for Crvena Zvezda he was floundering in the reserves for Benfica and got even benched there, he was partying the nights before games with the reserves and eating too much garbage. Ben Manga picks him up and serves him to a manager in Niko Kovac who's not only a compatriot but has a proven track record of setting players minds straight. Jovic walks into a team and a city full of ex Yugoslavs, somehow immediately becomes the poster boy of professionalism, Kovac is replaced by a manager a lot better at unlocking attacking potential and Jovic earns himself a move to Madrid in two years. Kostic is a similar case, was branded a mercenary winger with poor work ethic by his last two clubs, Hütter realises to maximise his ridiculous stamina and dynamism he needs to play further behind and after a full season there he's possibly the best wing back in Europe.
Or you get a situation like with Griezmann. I was a big fan ever since he broke into the Erreala first team and wanted us to sign him since long before he went to Atletico (so I have at least that over statDNA). Still not in a million years would I have expected him to become the complete forward he is now simply because his game was so dramatically altered by Simeone that there's no recognising him any longer, so you could almost forgive them for their poor judgement. Almost because he was always a class winger
And finally Mustafi - a tool such as statDNA would have little chance to predict his downfall for us, because he wasnt a bad player before he came here. Forget about quality even his way of defending has changed since 2016, before he would be aggressive but not as proactive in his defending as that was Otamendis role. He moved here and Wenger's handsoff approach to coaching coupled with a couple other factors including possibly his mentality made him crumble, badly enough that you wonder whether even the coach who built him in Nuno would be enough to salvage something there. On the other hand you see him work with Boly and Coady and you think even as shite as hes become Mustafi is not an intrinsically worse defender than those two
Scouting is a matter of knowing what to look for, it's not just plain quality. Otherwise Afonso Alves would've obliterated the league and Piszczek who's Dortmunds best defender to this day would still be a piss poor striker as he used to be before Mislintat and Klopp bought him in 08. Mislintat himself explained it best when he said you look not just at what happens but what could happen scaled to your own circumstance, remember Guendouzi and how unimpressive he looked at Lorient (I was thoroughly underwhelmed with the couple clips I've seen). But the scout saw something and gave Emery a young player with altered how to use instructions and all of a sudden we have one of the most exciting midfield prospects around. Scouting is relatively easy to get a grasp of but to master it or be able to beat the market consistently you need to know what the fuck you're doing.
